Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

apple.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

531–540 of 878 posts

Re: A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

#531

Post by sundvor »

My son's few-years old iPad (who knows what model since Apple stopped actually naming them) turned into a lagfest after the iOS 11 update. UI operations are choppy where they used to be smooth. Could it be the battery?

Samsung, under intense criticism from their Note 7 battery scandal, didn't increase battery capacity with their S8. Instead, they opted to take steps to greatly improve battery life (total capacity loss over time). Whilst I still think retaining 95% after a year is wildly optimistic, I'm happy with this change of focus (yes, I bought one).

PS. I noticed that Apple uses lifespan where I use life, and life where I use capacity. Verdict?

Re: A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

#532

Post by jasonlotito »

eloop wrote: post #511

"making iPhones last as long as possible is an important part of that." ... Then I suggest that you do something unheard of and really stretch Johnny Ives to come up with the unthinkable, nearly impossible, design task....an easily replaceable battery.

Yeah. People talk about how nice the phones are, but honestly, I feel like Apple takes the easy way out in this regard. It's easier to make what they do when you don't have to worry about letting users services the device. The flip side is, when everything is so tightly tied together, the quality has to be that much greater. They should be held to a much higher standard because they have no one to blame but themselves.

In this case, this is completely on them.

Re: A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

#533

Post by austenallred »

wwweston wrote: post #459
austenallred wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know it's not common for people to say this out loud, but I spent $1200 on an iPhone last month, and a. I don't care about a headphone jack, at all; I use Airpods and the experience is phenomenal b. Consider me crazy, but I actually like my phones getting smaller and lighter What if Apple is just making a phone for people like me, and is comfortable with those trade-offs?

> I don't care about a headphone jack, at all Does "works for me" work for you as a reason for closing a software ticket? Built-in speakers and bluetooth are probably the most common audio output cases for me , and I suspect it's that way for most people. It's totally fine and probably a good idea to recognize that and improve the experience on that front. But complicating corner cases are a definite reality. If you'…

It’s really simple:

1. It’s impossible for Apple to make a device that perfectly pleases everyone

2. Not all feature sets are possible

3. Apple constantly makes decisions about which trade-offs to make

Sometimes you’re just not the target market for a device a company makes. That’s ok, and it isn’t necessarily the fault of the company that such is the case, they just opted for a different feature set than the one you would have preferred.

Re: A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

#534

Post by jasonlotito »

briandear wrote: post #429
geophile wrote: post #392

That's well and good, but this letter avoids the elephant in the room. Apple has gone way too far in sacrificing functionality for style. I'll accept a seam in the phone, and a slightly thicker phone, if I could replace the battery myself. (That might also avoid the camera bump.) The latest MBP really shit the bed with that poorly conceived touchbar, and the horribly inferior keyboard. And in general, for many years…

Inferior keyboard? I LOVE the new keyboard. And Touch Bar works great.

Unfortunately, Apple doesn't seem willing to support the Touch Bar.

Re: A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

#535

Post by austenallred »

thanatropism wrote: post #396
matwood wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm with you. The iPhone X is the best iPhone I've ever used. The headphone jack uproar was a tempest in a teapot. Apple saw the stats that either a) people use the headphone that come with the phone or b) they upgrade to wireless headphones. The small group of people using expensive wired headphones can afford an additional $7 permanent attachment. Yes, Apple prioritizes size and design over everything else. Removab…

I'm just an anecdote, but I lamented the removal of the headphone jack because it means my 6SE is my last iPhone. I take pills for attention deficit disorder. I lose stuff. I lose corded and cordless headphones multiple times a month. And hey, I know my inattentiveness to be an annoying end of a spectrum. People have things going on in their lives. Not everyone neatly takes care of their in-separate-ears tiny bluetoo…

For what it’s worth, the AirPods have “find my AirPods” that will locate them for you in most instances.

I lose stuff too. I just find it eventually.

Re: A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

#537

Post by tinus_hn »

djsumdog wrote: post #195
jmull wrote: post #115

> Apple is reducing the price of an out-of-warranty iPhone battery replacement by $50 — from $79 to $29... > Early in 2018, we will issue an iOS software update with new features that give users more visibility into the health of their iPhone’s battery, so they can see for themselves if its condition is affecting performance. There we go. It took too much trouble and too long for it to happen, but Apple is stepping u…

This isn't the first time this has happened to Apple. They use to not sell replacement batteries for the original iPods, and when people called in to complain, they were often told to buy an entire new iPod. This was settled in a lawsuit: http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/apples-ip... Another important note is this battery replacement cost only cover the iPhone6 and up. That's only the 2015 release.…

The update that ‘caused’ this issue only did so for the iPhone 6 and up so a replacement wouldn’t be necessary for older models.

Also, if you must keep using these old phones when they are no longer supported and have known and unpatched vulnerabilities, please be a good citizen and keep them off of our internet.

Re: A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

#538

Post by megaman22 »

throwanem wrote: post #373
megaman22 wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure it's cheaper to solder it in, and you don't have to make the components sturdy enough to stand up to repeated assembly and dissassembly. I still hate it. It was nice to be able to have a stack of charged batteries and not worry about being away from an outlet for three or four days. Especially with a phone that had its USB port melted by a shoddy cable.

"My USB port is melted and unusable but I don't want to replace it" is a real corner case in hardware design, don't you think?

Not everybody can afford to just go buy a new phone when some minor component fails. With replacable batteries, a busted usb port was an annoyance, but without, it makes an expensive and otherwise functional piece of technology into a paperweight.

Re: A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

#539

Post by pier25 »

taspeotis wrote: post #296
stalf wrote: post #275

Trying to raise awareness to the fact that Apple's battery letter is only available on the american store. We in Brazil already experience absurd prices (a battery replacements costs R$ 449,00, equivalent to US$ 136,41), but I doubt will see equivalent reductions...

The article does mention price reductions “starting in late January and available worldwide through December 2018.“

> available worldwide through December 2018

Which is quite frankly ridiculous. Nothing really justifies waiting a year for this.

Apple already has everything it needs to replace batteries worldwide right now (either with third party official repair companies or their own), and the cost of doing so will not likely change from here to December 2018.

Re: A Message to Our Customers about iPhone Batteries and Performance

#540

Post by ianamartin »

I'm glad they did this, but it still doesn't handle the FUD about Apple generally slowing down old hardware in the name of planned obsolescence, which people have been tinfoil-hatting about since forever.

The fact is that new OS and software is designed to run on the latest hardware and checked on older hardware to see if it will work at all.

The conspiracy theorists think that Apple has been doing this with their phones since they started making them, and for their computers for decades.

It's horseshit, of course, and I wish the statement had been stronger.

The tinfoil garbage is about like if people complained that game companies were intentionally slowing things down for older graphics cards. No. That's just the natural progression as technology advances.

This is a case where Apple is slowing things down, but doing so to improve the user experience, not make it worse.

You have almost all of reddit and several other idiot websites that have been complaining for years about perceived slow-downs now feeling vindicated over this. And it's complete garbage.

I wish people could separate issues effectively, but that doesn't seem to be in the cards.

Post reply on HN